T-Pain On Aaliyah: ‘Now That She’s Passed It’s Like, ‘Nobody Could Be Her!”

Music News

T-Pain may have accidently put his foot in his mouth again. During a listening party for his recently released The Iron Way mixtape, T-Pain attempted to clear up exactly how he acquired Aaliyah’s vocals for the song “Girlfriends.”

However, he entered controversial territory when he said that Aaliyah’s legacy is somewhat overhyped and forced into exclusivity simple because she passed away. His wording may ruffle a few feathers:

First of all, let me just say that a lot of people are pissed off about that for some reason. I’m seeing a lot of people directly say, ‘He doesn’t deserve her vocals.’ So I’m trying to figure out what the fuck did I do. So what happened was they were doing Aaliyah X album and they came to me for a feature on the album. They had a bunch of sessions and unused tracks from her. So instead of being a dick and charging the shit out of them, I was like, ‘Yo, just give me one of the sessions.’ And they were like, “Cool. We ain’t gotta pay, right?’ It was just like a swap. I did a song for her album and they gave me one for mine.

People tend to–I don’t know, man. I’m not trying to discredit Aaliyah in any kind of way. But you know how sometimes people die–yeah. You know how somebody’s an asshole their whole life, but when you go to their funeral it’s like, ‘This guy was the greatest man ever.’ No, I’m just sayin’!

I’m not saying it’s Aaliyah but it’s like because she passed, nobody is deserving. Nobody is good enough because she passed. If she was still alive, then everybody would’ve been like, ‘Oh! She tryna be Beyonce!’ if she were still alive right now. But now that she’s passed, it’s like, ‘Nobody could be her! Nobody could be her!’ That’s just how I feel. That’s how people are, man. People look for shit to talk about.